February 23, 2025
Epiphany 7, Year C
Genesis 45:3-11, 15; Luke 6:27-38
Epiphany, Winnipeg
This is one of those pieces of the Biblical story that I think always needs to begin with a bit of a disclaimer, because some of these things that Jesus says – “Do good to those who hate you; pray for those who abuse you; turn the other cheek when you’ve been struck; if someone takes from you don’t demand it back again” – have been used over the years to tell people to submit to whatever injustice they are living with, or to let the ones who harm just keep on doing what they’re doing; let them off the hook. All of that’s just wrong. Jesus is not counselling abused people to stay in abusive relationships or to let bullies get away with their bullying. He’s not telling people whose land has been taken just to let the colonizers keep it and to act like nothing’s wrong: “Just get over it.” He’s not telling oppressed people to pray for their oppressors and then just put up with what’s being done and act like everything’s OK.
Let’s just kind of keep that in mind as we wade through some of this….
1. I heard a story from a black South African pastor a few years ago. Quite a few years ago, actually, during the height of the Apartheid era, sometime in the mid-80s. The story goes something like this:
His mom was raising three sons on her own, and this family of four lived in relative poverty in a small township somewhere in South Africa. I’ve forgotten the name of the exact place. The pastor telling the story was the youngest in the family, and his two older brothers had become very politically active in the opposition movement. So of course, they were always under suspicion and the police kept a close eye on them.
Every so often, heavily armed police would show up in the middle of the night to “inspect” the house, which meant that they went from one end to the other emptying everything and turning over everything to try to find something that could be used as evidence against any resisters in the house. Or maybe they didn’t expect to find anything. They just wanted to keep everyone afraid.
Their mom couldn’t prevent the police from coming in and doing whatever they wanted. She couldn’t just demand her rights, or ask to see a search warrant. If the powers wanted to come in and look around, you didn’t have much choice but to let them in. So when the police came by in the middle of the night she would let them in, and when they started turning the house upside down she went into the kitchen and made biscuits. And when the “inspection” was finished, she would make tea, insist that her guests sit down at the kitchen table, and she would feed them tea and biscuits.
She wouldn’t take no for an answer. And with that strange show of hospitality she was not giving up, and she was not submitting to anyone’s authority, and she was not saying that it’s all OK. Oh no. She gave them tea and biscuits and she said loudly and clearly with no more words than “Here you go,” and “Have another one,” that she was not going to play their games of power and violence and fear. She took charge, started up another way, and laid out tea and biscuits.
Just imagine being one of those who had come to the house with weapons and power and the authority to do whatever you want on behalf of the state. You’re doing all you can to keep this woman and her sons afraid, and this woman just makes you sit down and have biscuits and tea.
Today I wonder if maybe she had an image in her mind some times of Jesus sitting with his disciples and saying the things we heard today: Things like “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you.” She and Jesus both just knew that there are other ways. She and Jesus just decided not to play the game of violence and fear and revenge.
2. Maybe Jesus had another story in mind as he sat down and talked with his disciples that day. A story he had learned from rabbis or parents or grandma or the smart kid down the street who just knew all the stories. It’s the story of Joseph and his brothers – we heard the tail end of it a few minutes ago - and it goes something like this:
Joseph was the second youngest among twelve brothers and a sister. He was the one who got special gifts from his dad; the one whose brothers always thought was their dad’s favourite; one of those little ones who got all the love. You know how it is with the youngest ones.
The older ones grew tired of their little brother, and one day when they were out looking after the flocks in the fields they decided they’d had enough of him. They grabbed hold of him, stripped him of the fancy clothes their dad had given him, and sold him to slave traders. The slave traders took him away to Egypt to sell him again, and the brothers went home and told their dad that a wild animal had taken his favourite son.
The whole story of Joseph and his ancestors – our ancestors in the faith, you know - is full of stories like this one. A brother kills a brother; the youngest child cheats the oldest child; the daughters and mothers turn family members against each other, or the daughters and the mothers are there for the men and the boys to do with as they please. When Joseph is sold by his brothers, it’s just one more broken family story.
Fast forward a few decades now, and things have actually gone well for Joseph in Egypt. In a surprise turn he’s become the king’s right hand man. He’s not a slave any more; he sort of runs the country. One day a band of brothers shows up in Joseph’s office. They tell him that they come from a far away land, and that there is no food there, and they have come to buy food from Egypt so that they and their families won’t starve.
They think that Joseph is just some official in Egypt, but Joseph knows better, and he recognizes them. These are his brothers who so many years ago sold him into slavery.
He doesn’t tell them who he is. Instead, he just gets some cold slow revenge. He tells them that he thinks they’re thieves and spies – terrorists crossing the border – and he throws them in jail. Then he lets them out. He holds one of their brothers hostage and sends the others back to their country to get their younger brother – it’s a trip that takes months over deserts and mountains. He accuses them of stealing his gold and silver. He plants so much fear in them.
But at a few places along the way, Joseph sneaks away alone and weeps; weeps for his brothers and his father and the broken story that they share.
We pick up the story today when Joseph gives up on the revenge and the fear. He finally tells them who he is, and he welcomes them. He weeps aloud now, right in the open. He can’t control his joy, and his grief, and maybe even his relief that now all these games are done and the hurting has ended and his old home has come back to him. And now his brothers make the long trip home and back again, but this time they bring back their dad and their partners and their kids and their grandkids. They’re a whole caravan, and they cross the border because there’s no wall there, there’s just Joseph who welcomes them all and gives them a new home in this place with food and safety.
These people, all these people, are finally at home together, because love and mercy prevailed, and somebody finally said, “Enough. There’s got to be another way. The hate, the fear, the revenge will stop here.”
4. I don’t know. Maybe Jesus had that story in mind as he talked with his disciples, and he’s holding up another way to be in the world. In a world that is so divided by games of violence and fear and revenge, and in a world that is ruled so easily by so few, Jesus is offering another way. Because violence for violence and hate for hate and fear for fear have really gotten us nowhere.
He doesn’t spell out the details or lay out a program or say to us, “Well, Epiphany, here’s what you’re supposed to do in 2025 when this happens and that happens and the world is what it is.”
We don’t get detailed instructions. We’ve got our own hard work to do to find our way in the world and wage peace and work for justice. But we get some stories from our tradition. There’s this brother named Joseph who has been so hurt but who finally chooses a way of mercy instead of punishment. There’s this South African mom, our sister, I never heard her name but let’s call her Josephine, and with biscuits and tea she chooses a way of determination and strength and grace rather than fear.
And there’s this one named Jesus, who chooses a way that leads him to a cross. No revenge, no power from on high, no thunderbolts or swords. Just hands full of compassion; just love and forgiveness; kindness pressed down to get as much into the pot as he can, shaken together, running over, poured into the lap of the world. Just life, given for all.